Rationale

This project is expected to assist the government in its efforts to bring sustainable and equitable development, particularly in the less developed regions of the country. It shall also include providing greater scope for increasing INVESTMENTS in reconstruction and infrastructure development, through increased revenue collection and better expenditure management to put the country's economy on a sustainable path of development.

The impact of the project will result in sustainable social and economic development in the country. This will be achieved through more effective public resource management. The higher and more targeted public INVESTMENTS that result from effective public resource management in turn contribute to the development of human resources and physical infrastructure, thereby attracting private INVESTMENTS. This is a key theme in the governments' ten year development framework. Governments' finances are expected to move to a virtuous cycle of INVESTMENTS leading to higher economic growth and higher revenues through better tax buoyancy. This in turn would enable the government to INVEST further in the improvement of social and physical infrastructure.

The expected benefits of the project will be evident across multiple domains:

Financially

The rate of return on the project is substantially higher than either the weighted average cost of capital or the yield rate on alternative investments (e.g., treasury bills).

Economically

The project will lead to more sustainable development in the country as a result of increasing allocations for public investments in social and economic infrastructure, and targeted investments in the less developed regions

Socially

The needs of vulnerable groups will be better addressed in the medium- to long-term through, for example, increased social spending and the investments required to protect the livelihoods of vulnerable populations, and enhanced social safety nets.

Fiscally

With improved budget preparation, execution, and monitoring resulting from the integrated treasury system, spending will be distributed more evenly throughout the year contributing to efficiency enhancement in public spending and reduction in the gap between budgeted amounts and spending and more broadly, the governance benefits of the project include greater transparency in the use of public resources which will ensure accountability and fiduciary risk management at all levels of government, including through minimization of human intervention in revenue administration.

In addition, the results from improved performance monitoring and reporting systems will feed into the planning and budgeting process. The Public Accounts Committee of the Parliament will be able to use the audit results to ensure accountability of public spending and to control irregularities. Internal and external control measures and oversight will also be easier to put in place to reduce possibilities for mismanagement and corruption. Transparency in budgeting and expenditure programs will enable citizen feedback on poor service delivery and corrective actions being taken. One specific impact of such transparency will be evident in the articulation of gender-specific interests (largely through specific gender targeting in the budget). The information systems will considerably facilitate this targeting.

The integrated treasury management information system is expected to provide significant benefits in managing public resources more effectively, especially:

Full integration of budget and budget execution data, thereby allowing greater financial control timely monitoring of the government's cash position provision of adequate management reporting at various levels of budget execution improvement of data quality for preparation and execution of the budget facilitation of the preparation of financial statements and other financial reports for budgeting and analysis; online information availability related to state-wide expenditure and revenue effective expenditure planning accurate revenue forecasting